To Sir, With Love
by JeanNicole
Summary: He mistakenly thought he could love another after her. She mistakenly thought he could love her. Snape/OC.


I was inspired by two things in writing this.

1. The revelation the Snape was in love with Lily in DH/The idea that he must have been very lonely because he could have never loved anyone else.

2. The song "To Sir, With Love." Yes, this means Snape gets it on with a student. It's okay, it's not graphic. Graphic sex scenes and I don't get along.

This isn't my best work, but I hope you'll enjoy it all the same.

* * *

Severus Snape sat writing at his desk in his office late one night when Emma Danks entered. 

"Professor, I have my essay. You know, on dragon scales and their uses. I'm sorry it's late."

"Could you please explain to me why I should accept this?" he answered without looking up at her.

"I'm sorry. It's just that… Never mind." Her face fell and she turned to leave the office.

"Come back here!" Professor Snape said sharply. "Convince me."

"I don't really have a good excuse, sir. I just haven't been feeling well, that's all."

"You've never been a problem before." He thought for a moment. "Give me your essay. You'll lose points for lateness. Get to the hospital wing and sort out whatever problem you're having. Don't miss my class again. I don't tolerate slacking."

"Yes, sir. I'm sorry."

"I'm sure you are, but all the same. Now, it's late. Get to bed before you lose points for your house."

"Good night, then."

As Emma left the room, Snape went back to his work, wondering absently what could have been wrong with the girl who never seemed to have problems. He scribbled some notes in the margin of his parchment about an alternate ingredient for a sleeping potion before turning to Emma's essay. She had clearly done plenty of research and written a very informative essay on the topic. Severus Snape was not in the habit of giving his students perfect scores, so he deducted a few points for the odd spelling error and several more for lateness, giving Emma a final score of twenty-five out of forty. 

The next day, during sixth year potions with Slytherin and Ravenclaw, Professor Snape observed his students making a sleeping potion and he noticed that Emma was simply staring at her cauldron and the instructions, but wasn't doing anything. 

"Ms. Danks, is there a problem?" He demanded.

"There is."

"What is it?"

"I can't see wanting to put a person to sleep badly enough to kill an animal to use as an ingredient."

Snape had a list in his mind of problems he had expected to encounter when he began teaching. A student who cared about animal welfare enough to not do her work was not one of these things.

"Have you thought of a solution to this problem?" Snape asked, "Because you will be getting a zero for the day if there isn't a sleeping potion with your name on it on my desk by the end of class."

"I suppose considering that my potions professor is as inconsiderate as you are, I suppose I'll be accepting a zero. Professor Slughorn was always willing to compromise." Ah, _there_ it was. Snape should have known that there was no such thing as a student that didn't cause problems.

"I am not Professor Slughorn. Five points from Ravenclaw for the insult." Snape strode away to observe the rest of the students' work. 

At the end of class, Emma had not made any sort of potion, but had sat pouring through her potions book, looking for Merlin knows what. She had nothing to hand in. She did not ask for any special treatment, she simply left with the other students to move on to Herbology. 

Knowing Emma, however, Professor Snape should have known he hadn't heard the last of it. Late that evening after supper, Emma knocked on the door to Snape's office and walked in without waiting for an answer. Snape looked at her, barely able to keep his surprise from showing on his face. She set a vial of something on his desk and waited for him to examine it. 

"You made the sleeping potion. After you so adamantly refused to do so in class."

"Don't look so satisfied. I didn't do it your way. I replaced the beetles."

"How long did it take you to figure out the alternative?"

"I found it just before the end of class, so there wasn't time to make it then."

"I can't accept any more late work from you."

"I understand that. I'm not asking you to accept it."

"Then what do you want?"

"I just didn't want you to think I hadn't gotten anything from the lesson." She picked up the vial that held her sleeping potion and turned to leave.

"Thursday's potion involves dead animals, too. You might start looking for alternatives to those as well. Page three hundred and seventy."

"Thanks for the warning."

Thursday morning, after watching some hapless Hufflepuff explode yet another cauldron, Professor Snape looked into the nearby cauldron of Emma Danks. The potion was an opaque yellow, exactly as it should be, even without the rat tail. Emma lost points on the assignment for not following the instructions, although the potion was otherwise perfect. 

"Professor," Emma said when class was over, "why is this the only class in which I don't have perfect marks?"

"I don't believe in perfect marks. There is no such thing as perfection." 

Of course, this was not true. There was one perfect person in the world. At least, she was perfect in his eyes. Although, the place where she was could not _really _be called "the world." Professor Snape has seen perfection, and it was his fault that this perfection was lost to the world. 

"Well, regardless of your _beliefs_, sir, I met all of the requirements. It isn't fair that I shouldn't have-"

"Life is not usually fair, you'll find."

Severus Snape sat at the staff table in the Great Hall eating his supper and not talking to anyone. His eyes fell briefly on some particularly horrid students, whom he sneered in the direction of, though they did not see him. He glanced at the Ravenclaw table and sneered a skittish first year, who saw him, gasped and looked away. He the saw Emma, who was pouring through her potions book and ignoring her food, apparently determined to find something that would guarantee that perfect score she was in search of. From a distance, she suddenly looked very like-

"Severus," said Professor McGonagall sharply, elbowing him, "I know you've just started teaching and you may not have worked everything out yet, but staring at a student in that fashion is definitely _not_ part of your job."

He turned and glared at her for a moment and went back to eating and sneering.

Months after the first kiss and weeks after the first hasty encounters in Snape's office, during which he was no longer "Professor," but "Severus," she stayed for the first time. No one knew that there was a students out of bed that night, or rather, out of her own bed. Nothing terrible happened. Nobody even saw her leave in the morning, and none of the girls who shared her dormitory asked any questions about where she had been. The two spent the day avoiding each other's eyes, lest someone see what they were thinking and remembering. Emma spent the day answering questions too quickly and panicking at the notion that somebody might notice something strange in the way she spoke to or about the professor. Snape spent the day snapping at students in an attempt to hide his good mood. 

There were many good, beautiful feelings in this relationship, but over these good feelings hovered a gray cloud of nervousness. Emma caught a terrible cold from one of her dormitory mates and was stuck in the hospital wing for a few days, where it would have been highly suspicious for Snape to have visited her. The only safe places for them to meet were Snape's quarters and the Room of Requirement. 

Severus cared deeply for Emma, even despite the frequent differences of opinions. He wasn't sure this caring could be called "love" at this point, but he thought maybe it could become that in the future. Emma, however, was in love. 

They spent one night in the Room of Requirement and after the love had been made, Severus Snape said that they needed to talk. 

"You can't be happy with me. Having to hide. And what if anyone found out? You could be ruined."

"You mean _you_ could be ruined. _I _have nothing to lose in this."

She was right, of course. He had mentioned her reputation, but it was his that he was really concerned about. He had only _just_ found a career, and with his past, how could he ever find a new one? And if he was honest with himself, he couldn't say that he cared quite deeply enough to risk his skin for her. And, as long as he was being honest, he had to wonder if it was Emma he cared for or the one she reminded him of.

"Look, Emma, you…"

"I think I see what you're saying," she said quietly, looking away so that Severus could not see the tears forming.

"No, I don't think you do. I'm not saying I don't care. I do care. Really."

"Severus… I love you. But… Do you love me?"

"I… I care for you."

"But do you love me?"

"Damn it, Lily-"

"Lily?" She said, slightly horrified that he had just gotten her name wrong now, after everything.

"Emma, Emma, I didn't mean-"

"Who in the _world _is Lily?" she yelled. Surely anyone passing in the hall would have heard her.

"She isn't anyone." _Liar,_ he thought.

"She must be someone."

"She's dead."

"Severus, if you love someone else-."

"I said she's dead."

"But you _love her_. And if you can't love _me_, then what are we doing here?"

Severus had been asking himself this for quite some time. He honestly _did_ care about Emma, and he thought maybe he _could_ love her, but could he? With thoughts of Lily in the back of his brain all the time, could he really love anyone quite as much? He wasn't sure he could.

"I… don't know."

"If you can't…" Emma sighed and continued, "then I guess it's over, isn't it?"

"It's for the best, I think. For both of us."

"I know." The tears were falling down her cheeks, making Severus wish he had never started this conversation and things had just gone on the way they had been.

"Emma, this… It hurts me, too."

"Severus, can we please, just for the rest of tonight, pretend it isn't?"

He nodded and she leaned on him, throwing her arms around his neck like a child wanting comfort, which really, is all she was. He pulled her onto his lap and kissed her. She cried while he held her silently until they both fell asleep.

In the morning, Severus Snape woke alone. During Emma's Potions lesson, she did the assignment without a sound and without ever looking in his direction. Professor Snape continued teaching, pretending that seeing her didn't break his heart like he'd thought only Lily could.

She approached his desk and handed him a vial of potion and their fingers brushed. She looked briefly into his eyes before hurrying away. 

They met in a deserted corridor later that afternoon. She froze and looked at him as though her heart was breaking and his was, too. He reached for her hand, but she pulled it away. "Please, Professor, don't make it even harder to let go." He knew what she meant, but he was finding it difficult to help himself. 

Emma walked away slowly and turned down another corridor and that was the end. For the rest of the term, they pretended not to know each other and tried to ignore their aching hearts and churning stomachs whenever their fingers touched and they remembered the feel of those fingers in other places, in other times. He was no longer "Severus" to her, but "Sir," and she had become "Ms. Danks." Slowly, they healed. As they had agreed, it was for the better. Severus knew that his feelings for Emma, though strong, only hurt him so much because they were fresh. In time, she would leave his mind and he would see some other girl along the way who reminded him of Lily that would make his heart yearn for her. He may even pretend she _was_ Lily, but like Emma, she would only be a temporary distraction from his pining for Lily. There was no erasing her from his mind. Lily Evans would always be there somewhere. It was only Emma's misfortune that led her to Severus Snape that year, and was her greater misfortune that she managed to fall in love with him; that she had given him things she could never get back. Of course, Severus felt guilt for this. But could it have been helped that she got to him?


End file.
